US law

DNA Evidence Clears Two Men in 1983 Murder - NYTimes.com. Photo LUMBERTON, N.C. — Thirty years after their convictions in the rape and murder of an 11-year-old girl in rural North Carolina, based on confessions that they quickly repudiated and said were coerced, two mentally disabled half brothers were declared innocent and ordered released Tuesday by a judge here.

The case against the men, always weak, fell apart after DNA evidence implicated another man whose possible involvement had been somehow overlooked by the authorities even though he lived only a block from where the victim’s body was found, and he had admitted to committing a similar rape and murder around the same time. The startling shift in fortunes for the men, Henry Lee McCollum, 50, who has spent three decades on death row, and Leon Brown, 46, who was serving a life sentence, provided one of the most dramatic examples yet of the potential harm from false, coerced confessions and of the power of DNA tests to exonerate the innocent. Mr.

CISPA / TPP / ACTA / SOPA / PIPA / COICA. FISA. PATRIOT Act. DOJ. SCOTUS. Bill of Rights. US law: States. Boxed In: How a Criminal Record Keeps You Unemployed For Life. Prosecutor in Aaron Swartz 'hacking' case comes under fire. A politically ambitious Justice Department official who oversaw the criminal case against Aaron Swartz has come under fire for alleged prosecutorial abuses that led the 26-year-old online activist to take his own life .

If you think it’s a waste of money, VOTE YES on 48.” Mr. Miller, 46, a mechanical engineer, said he expected a debate. What he got instead was a legal action from supporters of the streetcar project under an Ohio law that forbids false statements in political campaigns. In the end, Mr. “I’ve got to second-guess myself every time I sit down in front of a computer,” he said. Last month, at a Supreme Court argument over a federal law that makes it a crime to lie about military honors, Justice Elena Kagan asked about laws like the one that had ensnared Mr.

It turns out there are at least 17 states that forbid some kinds of false campaign speech, according to a pending Supreme Court petition in a case involving a Minnesota law. At the argument last month, Solicitor General Donald B.
Comment: Stolen Valor and Super PACs. A peculiar law with a mellifluous name will meet its doom before the Supreme Court this week.

The reasons why will tell us something about the Presidential campaign. To explain: Congress passed the Stolen Valor Act in 2005 to address a distasteful, if not exactly earth-shaking, problem. News reports had revealed several cases of would-be politicians and other prominent people who had falsely claimed to be decorated war heroes. The new law made such lies a crime.
Why I’m Suing Barack Obama - Chris Hedges' Columns. Attorneys Carl J.

Mayer and Bruce I. Afran filed a complaint Friday in the Southern U.S. District Court in New York City on my behalf as a plaintiff against Barack Obama and Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta to challenge the legality of the Authorization for Use of Military Force as embedded in the latest version of the National Defense Authorization Act, signed by the president Dec. 31.
What makes our NDAA lawsuit a struggle to save the US constitution. I am one of the lead plaintiffs in the civil lawsuit against the National Defense Authorization Act, which gives the president the power to hold any US citizen anywhere for as long as he wants, without charge or trial.

In a May hearing, Judge Katherine Forrest issued an injunction against it; this week, in a final hearing in New York City, US government lawyers asserted even more extreme powers – the right to disregard entirely the judge and the law. On Monday 6 August, Obama's lawyers filed an appeal to the injunction – a profoundly important development that, as of this writing, has been scarcely reported.
The degradation of justice.

By now you will have read that self-described 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other alleged plotters will shortly have their day in court.

US law enforcement & criminal justice. U.S. Drug Policy Would Be Imposed Globally By New House Bill. The House Judiciary Committee passed a bill yesterday that would make it a federal crime for U.S. residents to discuss or plan activities on foreign soil that, if carried out in the U.S., would violate the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) -- even if the planned activities are legal in the countries where they're carried out.

H.R. 313, the "Drug Trafficking Safe Harbor Elimination Act of 2011," is sponsored by Judiciary Committee Chairman Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), and allows prosecutors to bring conspiracy charges against anyone who discusses, plans or advises someone else to engage in any activity that violates the CSA, the massive federal law that prohibits drugs like marijuana and strictly regulates prescription medication.

The law could also potentially affect academics and medical professionals. For example, a U.S. doctor who works with overseas doctors or government officials on needle exchange programs could be subject to criminal prosecution.